“With the new album I can kind of see it as a process of moving on” – interview with In Mourning

Swedish melodic death metal group In Mourning is currently working on a new album and they recently re-released their ”The Weight of Oceans” (2012) album. Chaoszine caught up with the band’s guitarist Björn Pettersson to tell us about the new music, re-release and what can be expected of the band’s summer festival shows.

Hello, In Mourning! How has your year started and who shall be answering our questions?

Björn Pettersson: Hello there! Year has started alright, no complaints so far. Björn here answering the questions.

You’ve just re-released your “The Weight of Oceans” album as a vinyl. Was there some specific reason why you decided to do so?

Björn: Well yeah, we thought it was about time to let this old beast resurface. It’s been a long story with that one, we recorded it in 2012 and it’s always been one of our best going albums but it’s been out of stock in physical formats for a long time, and as it’s been kind of a recurring question we decided to license it from Spinefarm and bring it back on both vinyl and cd.

Fun fact that Kaaoszine hosted the album pre-listening stream on our website back in the days when it was released. What are the first memories that come to your mind about this album? I guess it has been one of the most important albums for you to date?

Björn: Oh, yeah that’s right! Well it’s starting to be a long time ago now, we’re all getting old.. I do associate that album with Finland in many ways, maybe it’s due to signing to Spinefarm and so on. I think we had played shows in Finland before that album, but if I remember correctly we went to play more in Finland on that album. I remember Nummirock as a fond memory from that album period. I also remember rehearsing a LOT back then, we spent tons of time in the rehearsal space working on that album. We really dug deep into the mythology theme when we were writing that album and I remember feeling that we really made the whole album come together with the artwork, lyrics and music etc. It’s been an important album for sure, both as an album that has been kind of our “popular” album, but also the way we made it come together as a whole.

There is also new In Mourning music in the works. How far is the process at the moment and do you already know when the first single or even the full album will be dropping? Can we expect to hear any new tunes at Kaaos Festival show?

Björn: True, there’s new stuff in the works. We’re actually done recording a new album and waiting for the final masters right now, so it’s exciting times. The new album will be out after summer and we’ll be releasing some singles during the summer so I’d say there’s definitely chances we might pop out some new tunes at the Kaaos Festival.

Can you tell us about where you’ve drawn inspiration to this upcoming album and did re-releasing “The Weight of Oceans” inspire you in any ways?

Björn: I’d say each record is in some form a reaction from the previous one and some kind of reflection on life at the moment, like a constant movement. So in that way maybe on some level releasing “The Weight of Oceans” again plays some part in this new one too, even though maybe not in any obvious ways. The themes on the new album revolves much around acceptance and moving on, life and death and cycles of life and death in nature and in a year. I think we tapped into some pretty dark places while working on “The Bleeding Veil” and after having gone through the process with the new album I can kind of see it as a process of moving on.

What’s your creative process like in the studio? Do you write most of the material beforehand, or is there a lot of experimentation during recording?

Björn: All material is written very much in detail before entering the studio, we don’t do much experimentation in the studio as far as song structures and song writing goes. There’s of course processes of setting the right sounds and finding the right takes throughout the recording process which is maybe some sort of experimentations too. This time we went into the studio as a collective, living and breathing this album together in the studio for two weeks. Thinking back of it I don’t think we’ve actually really done it that way since back around when we did “The Weight of Oceans”.

You’ll be heading on a tour in Europe and we’ll be seeing you also here in Finland at Kaaos Fest and Dark River Festival. What can we expect from these Finnish shows?

Björn: Yeah, we’re stoked to get back to Finland. As we’ve been locked up in studio and then been wrapping up this album for some while now we’re starting to feel itchy to get out on stage. We’ll try to bring a finely tuned mix of new and old to squeeze the most out of these festival sets, it’s kind of a challenge to condense our songs into a festival set sometimes as the songs are all a bit lengthy.

You have visited Finland quite a few times through the years. What have been your best moments from Finland so far?

Björn: We do have lots of bonds to Finland for sure, we’ve been over a bunch of times and nowadays we’re happy to have a bunch of good friends over there. Timpa’s got relatives around Vaasa as well, so these summer festivals will be hearty for sure. Looking forward to coming back to Kotka and Dark River, that place felt like home away from home to us so that’s a fond memory for sure. Another special trip was joining Omnium Gatherum for “one last blast of melodic death metal” at Nosturi before it got laid to rest.

What does the future hold for In Mourning? What kind of plans do you have at the moment?

Björn: I think we’ve touched on a couple of things in the cooker already. Right now focus is really on making all ends meet for this new album and work on that release. Aside of Finland we also have a couple of Swedish shows this summer, there will be more of both shows and album related stuff coming along the way now so keep an eye on the internet if you’re interested in more of that.

Thank you for your time! Would you like to add something for Kaaoszine’s readers?

Björn: Just a big thank you and we’re looking forward to head over to Finland again this summer. Take care and keep an eye out for the new record.